Today on BASHAM AND CORNELL PROGRESSIVE TALK our guest is Marine Combat Vet John Conley, the amazing Marine who sent me his Purple Heart after the death threats my family received from Ann Coulter's fans...
The Basham and Cornell Show broadcasts weekday mornings at 8 am Pacific (11 a.m. Eastern) on KLAV 1230 AM Radio live in Las Vegas. All shows are simulcast on the Internet (and archived) and can be listened to at BASHAM AND CORNELL.COM We have interviewed Dennis Kucinich, John Edwards, Valerie Plame, Dahr Jamail, John Dean, Elizabeth Edwards, Mike Gravel; Pulitzer Prize winner Charlie Savage, Congressman Charlie Rangel, Senator Byron Dorgan; bestselling authors like Greg Palast, Mikey Weinstein, Paul Krugman; Media Matters’ Eric Boehlert and Paul Waldman are regular guests. Upcoming: Obama and Hilary. If you missed any of these shows, check out the archives on our website.
In the Screen Actor's Guild Building, there used to be a huge painting of Norma Rae holding the "UNION" sign. When I stepped off the elevator and saw it for the first time, it gave me goosebumps. It reminded me of the common cause we all share, not just as actors but as American citizens and workers.
I met Elizabeth Kucinich last night at a fundraiser for the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, and after hearing the speakers, it struck me anew that Democrats are desperately in need of hope and inspiration. We are all too mired in negativity, fear and hopelessness.
Elizabeth Kucinich, whom we're having on our show next week, has a positive, exciting new message, that inspired me to remember our true mission. We need to realize we are on the precipice of exciting, catastrophic change. We are on the edge of the NEW ENLIGHTENMENT. Instead of being defeated and pessimistic, we need to see that it's always darkest before the dawn. This is the perfect time to turn it all around. But we can't do it with incessant anger and fear. That's why Obama's message rang so true in the beginning. He was untainted. The naysayers' force of media worship and it's hideous underbelly hadn't gotten to him yet. So far, he seems to have stayed above the fray, but hasn't fulfilled expectations of the Great Colorblind Hope.
The naysayers in the media are trying to splinter us, and it may look like we've lost our balance — but now is the perfect time to see the silver lining in this whole shameful political spectacle.
BEST EXPLANATION OF THE WRITER'S STRIKE:
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Liberals and Democrats are passionate about ending this war and all future wars. Republicans have more cynicism about America's place in the world. Liberals are probably more pure and unjaded. We actually believed the American Dream that we were the peacekeepers of the planet - the good guys. As it turns out, we are the only civilized nation to have ever dropped a nuclear bomb on a civilian population. And now we have a delusional, fear-based president who is instilling terror in us by provoking nuclear conflict with Iran. It's like the Harry Truman quote on my sidebar:
But I no longer want to focus on the bad news. Everyone else is doing that. We need to be constructive and look at the good being created all around us. There is a silver lining to every single "bad" thing happening.
New industry will be created out of the oil and gas crisis. New forms of energy, new ways to save the planet, new jobs created, newfound simplicity and love for our fellow man.
Even the Writers Strike may turn out to be the beginning of a new paradigm — where antiquated corporations no longer have a stranglehold on the true owners of creative content. Who needs corporate bosses any way?
Think about it. See a new way. I will post more later.
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